3 ms·

In theory, in a competitive market, margins will decline over time and goods will be sold close to at cost. This is especially applicable to grocery/food where

In theory, in a competitive market, margins will decline over time and goods will be sold close to at cost. This is especially applicable to grocery/food where margins are razor thin. If we assume the inputs to impossible are significantly cheaper than beef, then cost of impossible should be significantly cheaper too. But you're right, subsidies distort the equation. If somebody can chime in with what the level of beef subsidy is, but I'm doubtful it's enough to offset using vegetables over cattle. Should be an order of magnitude cheaper in a free market, once production is scaled up appropriately.

sdenton4 5y ago
It seems (maybe unsurprisingly) complex to put an exact number on the cost of a non-subsidized hamburger. However[1], the US gives $38 billion per year in beef subsidies, and less than 1% of that amount for vegetable production. I found a couple links [2, eg] which claim $30-50 per pound of beef, if subsidies are removed. There are also some discussions to be found [3] of the cost of additional externalities. [edit : one can also try a simple-but-probably-wrong end-to-end estimate... Divide $38B by 325M to get $116 per person. Then divide by 57 pounds of beef consumption per person per year [4] to get ~$2 per pound. A quick search finds ~$4 per pound for ground beef, so one may naively guess the subsidies add up to at least a 33% discount.) [1] - https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/removing-meat-subsidy-our-cognitive-dissonance-around-animal-agriculture https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/removing-meat-subsidy-our-cogn... [2] - https://www.quora.com/How-much-is-the-average-pound-of-beef-subsidized-in-America-If-it-werent-for-that-subsidy-how-much-higher-would-the-market-prices-be https://www.quora.com/How-much-is-the-average-pound-of-beef-... [3] - https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/16/opinion/the-true-cost-of-a-burger.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/16/opinion/the-true-cost-of-... [4] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/183539/per-capita-consumption-of-beef-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/183539/per-capita-consum...

sdenton4 5y ago

It seems (maybe unsurprisingly) complex to put an exact number on the cost of a non-subsidized hamburger. However[1], the US gives $38 billion per year in beef subsidies, and less than 1% of that amount for vegetable production. I found a couple links [2, eg] which claim $30-50 per pound of beef, if subsidies are removed. There are also some discussions to be found [3] of the cost of additional externalities. [edit : one can also try a simple-but-probably-wrong end-to-end estimate... Divide $38B by 325M to get $116 per person. Then divide by 57 pounds of beef consumption per person per year [4] to get ~$2 per pound. A quick search finds ~$4 per pound for ground beef, so one may naively guess the subsidies add up to at least a 33% discount.) [1] - https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/removing-meat-subsidy-our-cognitive-dissonance-around-animal-agriculture https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/removing-meat-subsidy-our-cogn... [2] - https://www.quora.com/How-much-is-the-average-pound-of-beef-subsidized-in-America-If-it-werent-for-that-subsidy-how-much-higher-would-the-market-prices-be https://www.quora.com/How-much-is-the-average-pound-of-beef-... [3] - https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/16/opinion/the-true-cost-of-a-burger.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/16/opinion/the-true-cost-of-... [4] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/183539/per-capita-consumption-of-beef-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/183539/per-capita-consum...